Tuesday, July 10, 2007

I'm pleased to be able to say that I've contracted for a new book, Professional Ruby on Rails, scheduled to be available in "early 2008", hopefully February or March. The publisher is Wiley, through the Wrox imprint -- the ones with the red covers and the author's picture on them. Wiley wanted me to be sure and mention that the ISBN number is 9780470223888, so you'll be ready to pre-order it the second that becomes possible.

The imagined reader of the book is somebody who just finished a beginners book on Rails and is suddenly asked to build a complete public web application. The idea is to cover the kinds of topics that nearly every Rails site will deal with -- things like users and security, performance, deployment, navigation, team development. For each topic, I'll be discussing common solutions, existing tools, emerging standards and so on. There will also be a strong focus on writing tests throughout the book. Hopefully, I'll be able to go into more detail as more of the book is written.

I'm excited and scared. This is my first solo book, which both simplifies logistics and leaves me without a co-author to catch me when I'm totally off base. I know Rails pretty well, but there's nothing like facing a skeleton book outline to impress upon you exactly how much you don't yet know. Research has been lots of fun, though -- the Rails online community is fantastic.

Watch this space for more info about the book, the writing process, and anything else related. If you have a question, or if there's a specific feature that you think should be included, please do leave a comment or send me an email.

Who's This Guy?

Noel Rappin is the co-author of the books Jython Essentials and wxPython in Action, and the sole author of Professional Ruby On Rails. He works for Pathfinder Associates as the Director of Rails Practice.